I haven't exactly followed the internet cult of Neil deGrasse Tyson, but if this tweet is any indicator, then the guy isn't quite the super genius others portray him to be:

I don't know why they call it social science. It's simple: eliminate the rich. There, I've solved the biggest problems in social science. Try doing some real science sometime.

He doesn't even try to sugarcoat his sentiments! He doesn't say "tax the rich" or "force the rich to pay their fair share." He outright says "eliminate the rich." (And I can only assume by guillotine!)

If this guy were truly the genius his followers claim he is, then he could have easily spotted the glaring flaw in his logic: if you "eliminate" the richest people (the richest one percent, I assume), that just make the next people down the rich. You haven't eliminated the rich. You've only changed who the rich is.

The only way to eliminate "the rich" is to reduce humanity to one person. As long as you have more than one person, and someone else has more wealth than the other, you will always have someone who is rich.

This is why I can never take wealth redistribution seriously, whether it cloaks itself as communism, socialism, or welfarism: it's completely utopian! You cannot realistically solve the world's problems by attacking the rich and trying to make everyone equal. You will always fail. It would be ideal if everyone had equal wealth. That sounds nice on paper. But it only works on paper. It can never work in practice because it ignores human nature. You cannot attempt to help human beings while ignoring human nature.

Ignoring nature in any form is anti-science, which in turn makes Mr. Tyson ironically anti-science, despite being the scientist he is.

Neil deGrasse Tyson is one of the men I look up to. I consider him to be an intelligent man(who's very existence proves intelligent design, otherwise Dr. Tyson would not exist, because evolution cannot make a man that badass). Ultimately, I wish to shake his hand.

But he is as much a social scientist as I am an astrophysicist! And I want to be one myself because of him!

Many of the issues in social science stem from inequalities in "class"-- divided into wealth, power, and prestige. You can gain the other two easily with wealth. People with wealth have total power over 1) What society is taught in school, media, and elsewhere 2) What people believe as a result of that (including the mindset that supports their oppression) and 3) means of production in the US and elsewhere.

If wealth is redistributed so that it cannot be exchanged for power, no one should have the power to push society into a mindset that perpetuates our biggest issues in society-- the exact issues sociologists study.

"if you "eliminate" the richest people (the richest one percent, I assume), that just make the next people down the rich" He didn't mean literally eliminate them. He meant eliminating the richness from them and the system that profits them more than any human could ever need. If you redistribute resources and wealth in a relatively equal way, there will be those who have more money, but "rich" would have much less meaning and would not compare to the rich today.

To say that "handing down" the money would make other rich people would require that the money be distributed to a small amount of people. But if you support a greater population with the money, the wealth would be too "diluted" to make any one person rich. It would simply increase the quality of life for those oppressed by capitalism.

Not at all. Far be it from me to support populist cries of "get rid of the richest". I oppose the concept of wealth/poverty. If you remove the richest under capitalism, the next richest people will simply become the richest: The form of inequality is still identical. This is why fundamental inequalities cannot be removed in a capitalist framework ie by social democrats.

I know you don't like Vox Day but in his book The Irrational Atheist, there is an inventive and thought-provoking chapter called "The Case Against Science", where he makes this exact point (i.e. because science has given us weapons that can destroy all life on earth, any benefits it has given us previously have fallen away).

Tyson is great when he's in his element... unfortunately, astrophysics does not make you good at economics. Then again, not all social sciences are as developed as economics; if he was talking about Sociology, then he has a point.

Neil Degrasse Tyson is a brilliant scientist. I think he knows what he's talking about- if he disses the social sciences, then he probably knows better than you do. Where, I wonder, is your degree in astrophysics?

Furthermore, there's probably a lot more to this than this statement. Twitter is a horrible place to argue anything, due to the short amount of characters available to you. And yeah, you assume it's by guilloutine, because that's what your bias tells you. Tyson has never in the past been an advocate of violence, so I can only assume your assumption is unfounded.

And finally, you can be brilliant and at the same time hold very silly ideas. Some scientists believe in god, despite having all the information in the world. Some people are very bright, yet believe in all sorts of hokum. My own father was a PhD in physics, and he believe in dowsing.

"Neil Degrasse Tyson is a brilliant scientist. I think he knows what he's talking about"

"Where, I wonder, is your degree in astrophysics?"

"And yeah, you assume it's by guilloutine, because that's what your bias tells you. Tyson has never in the past been an advocate of violence, so I can only assume your assumption is unfounded."

My gosh are you for real? There's so much stupidity and hypocrisy in what you've just said I can't give you any credibility whatsoever, and I hope for the sake of my faith in mankind I don't even have to point out what's blatantly wrong with everything you've just said.

There was really no BS to call out based only on that tweet. BT accused Tyson of encouraging genocide of the rich, completely missing the obvious sarcasm.

Because he's a great scientist, he probably knows what he is talking about. That is what I'm saying. If Tyson says social sciences aren't good science, then I'll listen, because he's a scientist extraordinaire and I am not. It's not absolute, but until I hear a counterargument- funny that, none so far- I'll go on Tyson's knowledge.

Sarcasm, ever heard of that? 'Sides, he didn't even say "kill the rich". The exact word was "eliminate", and a wealthy elite could be eliminated simply by taking their money from them. Not that I think he was actually saying "let's eliminate the rich", because he wasn't.

If Tyson was being sarcastic, why are you then taking him seriously in the next sentence, and saying that what he says is probably true, because he's an esteemed scientist?

And Tyson is an expert in physics. He is not known for his expertise on social science.

As far as I'm concerned, social sciences are GOOD. They are fundamentally helpful, useful to understanding how society, politics, and the psychology of human affairs works. Trusting Tyson's arrogant, "sarcastic", and downright unwarranted dismissal of social science, just because "he's a great scientist" is irrational and requires a lack of freethought. I don't listen to what every "expert" says, especially when they arrogantly write off a subject they don't even excel in.

Look, I know what it's like to have Asperger's and not being able to tell the difference between seriousness and sarcasm, but this was obviously snark. The point of the tweet isn't "kill the rich", it's "social science=not science", that's plain to see.

And isn't it you who always nags about how our priorities are all wrong and that's why we can't care about small issues likw feminism, racism, secularism etc because Obama and the libtards are coming to take all your rights away, Orwellian style- and yet the moment somebody says something on twitter that you think is stupid, you latch onto it immediately. So I urge you- be consistent. Either focus only on liberty, or admit that we can care about smaller issues.

Oh, and I do think Tyson knows better than you or I whether the social sciences are proper science or not.

Maybe it is, but it feels downright stupid to say "I can only assume he wants to kill the rich" when it's Neil Tyson. If it had been some radical with a history of violence, sure, but this is not the case even a little.

Neil Tyson isn't being treated like a god. He's famous because he's a good scientist and a charismatic person- which, if you ask me, if a much better reason to be famous than many other celebrities today. He promotes science and good thinking, and that strikes a chord with a lot of people. Mind you, he was a student of Carl Sagan, and he's more or less carrying that same torch now. He's somebody that the secular community looks up to, as well as people in general who just like science. We need more role models like those.

I actually earned a BA in an economics-related field, and continue to study economics (casually) to this day. So no, I don't think it's reasonable to assume he knows more about social sciences than me based solely on his degree astrophysics, just as I wouldn't assume he knows more about brain surgery than a medical undergrad.

He's a scientist, and a very successful one at that. If he's saying that social sciences are not proper science per se, then I'm prepared to believe him. Not absolutely or out of hand; I'm open to arguments, but he's more learned than myself or most people on this planet. It's not that social sciences are worthless, or bogus, just that in his opinion, it's not actually science.

You're holding him as an authority in social sciences (appeal to authority) based solely on his work in astrophysics (fallacy). The fields in question have nothing to do with each other. It's the same fallacious argument as holding someone as an authority in evolutionary biology based solely on his work in theology.

"Every War america was involved in after WWII was us invading people over stuff we should have stuck out of, and we accomplished nothing by our presence other than raiding people's country and occupying it while we trashed their places in an effort to teach them so-called "democracy"

Nothing against the members of the military, but everything against our corrupt and foolish government.

WWII brought in more revenue because everyone was joined together in the same fight, both on the home front and over seas. People wanted to make a difference any way they could. Ever since then we've been fighting pointless wars trying to regain the same type of support.

Why doesn't our government just say:

"Look guys, we're broke. We need everyone and their dog providing to a common goal so we can get out of this situation or we will have to start selling land to other countries and this may HAVE include your homes"

But that's called communism, and we just can't have people working together because Cold War nonsense. For that matter, the cold war was an attempt to make us afraid of communist countries leading to hatred of people who use their policies instead of ours. Go figure."

That's why I honestly don't trust a single damn person when they talk about shared sacrifice since it doesn't involve clamping down on corporate welfare and providing unnecessary tax loopholes for major corporations like General Electric to avoid paying their taxes. While I'm all for raising taxes, it must also come with cutting spending where the biggest bloat occurs: Our defense budget. That means bringing back bases in countries that no longer threaten us (Germany anyone?) and using the revenue to fund infrastructure building here in America, or as one meme has stated:

"The United States should invade the United States, win the hearts and minds of its people, put them to work building bridges, roads, and schools, and bring the people democracy."